"It was nice to apologize and say, 'Sorry man, your next start is going to be in the College World Series,' " Esmay said, referring to ASU's sweep of Arkansas in a best-of-three super-regional.

No. 1 ASU (52-8) could get by with two starters in Omaha by winning its four-team bracket in three games and sweeping a best-of-three championship series. But that best-case scenario rarely unfolds, and more often the national champion is the team with the deepest pitching staff, which on paper is ASU or UCLA. The Pac-10 rivals are in opposite brackets and would meet only in the championship series.

Freshman Brady Rodgers worked two innings in Game 1 as a bridge between starter Seth Blair and Lambson. Left-hander Jimmy Patterson got an important situational out in Game 2 after starter Merrill Kelly had worked 6 1/3 innings, and Swagerty shrugged off allowing a tying home run in the ninth to throw 3 1/3 scoreless innings thereafter.

"It could have been devastating and cost us the game," pitching coach Ken Knutson said. "He (Swagerty) told me they weren't going to score again, and I said, 'Well, then we're going to win.' His reaction showed him as a competitor and his confidence in himself."

The Sun Devils' confidence couldn't be higher in Knutson, who was at Washington for 26 years as a player, assistant coach and head coach without reaching Omaha. His 1994 and '97 Huskies teams fell one win short of reaching the CWS.

Former ASU coach Pat Murphy hired Knutson after the Sun Devils finished third at the 2009 College World Series. Esmay retained him after replacing Murphy and said Knutson has done "one of the better pitching coaching jobs I've seen in a long time."

"He (Knutson) brought in a whole bunch of new ideas and different concepts of pitching," said Blair, the Pac-10 Pitcher of the Year with a 12-0 record. "At the end of the fall, he sat down with every pitcher and said, 'This is the type of pitch plan I want for you.' He got everyone's arm stronger.

"He gave us the confidence to understand how to pitch and what was going to make each individual successful. I couldn't be more proud of the way he's put this pitching staff together."

ASU is 47-0 when leading after seven innings, speaking to the back-end steadiness of Lambson (8-2, 2.10 ERA, 3 saves) and Swagerty (2-0, 2.06 school record 14 saves). Mix in three starting pitchers with double-digit wins and role pitchers such as Rodgers, Patterson and Jake Barrett, and the Sun Devils are perhaps better armed for Omaha than at any time since the Floyd Bannister era (1975-76).